More than 12 million women in Italy, equal to almost 51%, between the ages of 18 and 84, have experienced physical or psychological violence at least once in their lifetime but only 5% have reported the incident, according to a study carried out by Institute of Clinical Physiology of the National Research Council (CNR) in 2022 and the results of which were published Friday.

Over 2.5 million women (10.1%) reported currently experiencing situations of psychological violence and 80,000 (0.3%) said they were currently suffering physical violence.

The victims of violence were mainly women under 60 years of age with a medium-high level of education, a job and an average income and who were married and living with their partner, according to the study.

Over half had children.

CNR said the data on gender-based violence in Italy provide “evidence of a particularly extensive and only partly visible phenomenon”.